Review 328: Magic in the Moonlight

Magic in the Moonlight was a funny experience - it was a nice film - but maybe too nice to rank up with Woody Allen's best films.

Set in 1928, Stanley Crawford (Colin Firth) is an illusionist who is sent to the French Riviera to disprove a possible psychic Sophie Baker (Emma Stone), but the more he tries to disprove her and the more she tries to convince him, the closer they become.

The plot as a whole is nice if somewhat safe when compared to Woody Allen's previous work.
What Woody Allen has done is he has tried to make a movie that feels as if it was made in the 1920's (in fact I would believe it was actually made in 1928) in the style of a French movie (it's great to look at but not a whole lot happens). That's not to say the film is boring by any means, it's just the majority of film is spent with characters walking and doing very period piece sort of stuff and Stanley and Sophie interacting with one an other. Some people may find that formulaic, some people may find that cliche, but to put it in the politest way possible, it just doesn't take any chances like Woody Allen films do and it lacks the wow factor of a lot of his previous films.

But what makes it work are some genuinely heartwarming and romantic moments between Stanley and Sophie and their performances and chemistry are quite hard to resist and ultimately at the end of the day that is what kept this movie afloat.

On the subject of the character of Stanley going off to disprove Sophie, there are some moments where you wonder if she really is for real or weather she's faking it and the meditating scenes are really convincingly done and really engross. However the majority of the film is spent on Stanley and Sophie in romantic scenes, it kinda unintentionally takes away from the feel of the film and becomes a standard romance.

It is a well made, good looking film however, Woody Allen's direction is just fine overall, the production design (recreating 1920's France) is beautiful, the costumes are fabulous, the locations (the French Riviera) are gorgeous, the scenery is breathtaking, the music is magnificent and the ending, while predictable was beautiful and really well handled.

The acting is mostly strong, Colin Firth and Emma Stone are the highlights of the film, I'll say that much. When we first meet Stanley, he's a lot like how Cate Blanchett was like in Woody Allen's previous film Blue Jasmine, he's this really rude, very mean and snobbish character who is very hard to live with, but he has a slightly different character arch as he grows closer to Sophie, he learns from her and she learns from him. It's a sign of good character development.

Emma Stone is luminous and lovely as Sophie, she's very gentle, charming and very confident about her beliefs and there is a bit of mystery floating about her character, your wondering is she for real, is she not and there are moments when the film hooks you in that regard and Stone does that really well.

There are also some very fine supporting cast members in the film such as Simon McBurney, Jacki Weaver, Marcia Gay Harden, Hamish Linklater and Eileen Atkins and they do just fine with what they have to work with.

Overall I can't say Magic in the Moonlight is bad, I wanted to know what was going on and was invested at times and I liked Colin Firth and Emma Stones performances and I wouldn't go so far as to say it's Woody Allen's worst film, but I guarantee you it won't be appearing on my top ten list for 2014 any time soon, 3/5.

The Anonymous Critic.